Body pulled from bay in Ocean City

An unidentified body was pulled from the bay in Ocean City at about 7 p.m. Tuesday, according to local police and the Coast Guard.

Police did not provide the age, sex or identity of the body late Tuesday, pending the notification of relatives.

Ocean City police responded to the area of 32nd Street on Isle of Wight Bay at about 6:20 p.m. for a report of a possible dead body, police said. They then requested assistance from the Ocean City Coast Guard, according to Petty Officer Alonzo Curry, a Coast Guard spokesman.

The body was less than 200 yards from the shore and was pulled from the water after being reached by boat, Curry said. Curry said he believed the body was that of a man.

He said recovering bodies from area waters is one of the Coast Guard's jobs, but it is rare in Ocean City, a popular tourist beach town. The body was sent to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of Maryland for an autopsy, police said.

The body was found in the same general vicinity as that of another, missing-person investigation.

On April 23, Ocean City police asked for the public's help locating missing 22-year-old man Lance Corey Gaines, who was visiting the town with his family from upstate New York.

Gaines was last seen wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt at about 1 a.m. April 21 at The Sandbar on 33rd Street and Coastal Highway, police said. The bar, which attracts crowds for karaoke, is close to the Jolly Roger Amusement Park and about two blocks from the bay.

Gaines, who had brown hair and blue eyes and was 6 feet 4 inches tall and about 190 pounds, was reported missing by his family.

Police could not be reached for comment on whether they are investigating possible connections between the two cases.